1.
String instrument
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String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when the performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum—and others by hitting the strings with a wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord or piano, with bowed instruments, the player rubs the strings with a horsehair bow, causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy-gurdy, the musician operates a wheel that rubs the strings. Bowed instruments include the string instruments of the Classical music orchestra. All of the string instruments can also be plucked with the fingers. Some types of string instrument are mainly plucked, such as the harp, in the Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification, used in organology, string instruments are called chordophones. Other examples include the sitar, rebab, banjo, mandolin, ukulele, in most string instruments, the vibrations are transmitted to the body of the instrument, which often incorporates some sort of hollow or enclosed area. The body of the instrument also vibrates, along with the air inside it, the vibration of the body of the instrument and the enclosed hollow or chamber make the vibration of the string more audible to the performer and audience. The body of most string instruments is hollow, some, however—such as electric guitar and other instruments that rely on electronic amplification—may have a solid wood body. Archaeological digs have identified some of the earliest stringed instruments in Ancient Mesopotamian sites, like the lyres of Ur, the development of lyre instruments required the technology to create a tuning mechanism to tighten and loosen the string tension. During the medieval era, instrument development varied from country to country, Middle Eastern rebecs represented breakthroughs in terms of shape and strings, with a half a pear shape using three strings. Early versions of the violin and fiddle, by comparison, emerged in Europe through instruments such as the gittern, a four stringed precursor to the guitar and these instruments typically used catgut and other materials, including silk, for their strings. String instrument design refined during the Renaissance and into the Baroque period of musical history, violins and guitars became more consistent in design, and were roughly similar to what we use in the 2000s. At the same time, the 19th century guitar became more associated with six string models. In big bands of the 1920s, the guitar played backing chords. The development of guitar amplifiers, which contained a power amplifier, the development of the electric guitar provided guitarists with an instrument that was built to connect to guitar amplifiers. Electric guitars have magnetic pickups, volume control knobs and an output jack, in the 1960s, larger, more powerful guitar amplifiers were developed, called stacks
2.
Musical instrument classification
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Throughout history, various methods of musical instrument classification have been used. The most commonly used system divides instruments into string instruments, woodwind instruments, brass instruments and percussion instruments, the oldest known scheme of classifying instruments is Chinese and dates from the 3rd millennium BC. It grouped instruments according to the materials they are made of. However, the Chou-Li, an anonymous treatise compiled from sources in about the 2nd century BC, had the following order, metal, stone, clay, leather, silk, wood, gourd. The same order was presented in the Tso Chuan, attributed to Tso Chiu-Ming, more usually, instruments are classified according to how the sound is initially produced. The modern system divides instruments into wind, strings and percussion, the scheme was later expanded by Martin Agricola, who distinguished plucked string instruments, such as guitars, from bowed string instruments, such as violins. Classical musicians today do not always maintain this division, but distinguish between wind instruments with a reed and those where the air is set in motion directly by the lips, many instruments do not fit very neatly into this scheme. The serpent, for example, ought to be classified as a brass instrument, however, it looks more like a woodwind instrument, and is closer to one in many ways, having finger-holes to control pitch, rather than valves. Keyboard instruments do not fit easily into this scheme, for example, the piano has strings, but they are struck by hammers, so it is not clear whether it should be classified as a string instrument or a percussion instrument. Ottoman encyclopedist Hadji Khalifa also recognized the three classes in his Kashf al-Zunun an Asami al-Kutub wa al-Funun, a treatise on the origin. The division pervades Tboli thought about cosmology, social characters of men and women, victor-Charles Mahillon later adopted a system very similar to this. This scheme was taken up by Erich von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs who published an extensive new scheme for classication in Zeitschrift für Ethnologie in 1914. Their scheme is used today, and is most often known as the Hornbostel-Sachs system. Electrophones, such as the guitar or electric bass, which produce sound through electricity and is required to be plugged in to an amplifier. Later Sachs added a category, electrophones, such as theremins. Modern synthesizers and electronic instruments fall in this category, within each category are many subgroups. The system has been criticised and revised over the years, in 1932, comparative musicologist André Schaeffner developed a new classification scheme that was exhaustive, potentially covering all real and conceivable instruments. The Kpelle of West Africa also use this system and they distinguish the struck, including both beaten and plucked, and the blown
3.
Plucked string instrument
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Plucked string instruments are a subcategory of string instruments that are played by plucking the strings. Plucking is a way of pulling and releasing the string in such a way as to give it an impulse that causes the string to vibrate, plucking can be done with either a finger or a plectrum. Most plucked string instruments belong to the family, which generally consist of a resonating body, and a neck. The zither family does not have a neck, and the strings are stretched across the soundboard, in the harp family, the strings are perpendicular to the soundboard and do not run across it. The harpsichord does not fit any of these categories but is also a string instrument. Bowed string instruments, such as the violin, can also be plucked in the known as pizzicato, however, as they are usually played with a bow. Struck string instruments can be plucked as an extended technique. Plucked string instruments are not a category in the Sachs-Hornbostel classification, as some of them are simple chordophones and others are composite
4.
Fret
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A fret is a raised element on the neck of a stringed instrument. Frets usually extend across the width of the neck. On most modern western fretted instruments, frets are metal strips inserted into the fingerboard, on some historical instruments and non-European instruments, frets are made of pieces of string tied around the neck. Frets divide the neck into fixed segments at intervals related to a musical framework, on instruments such as guitars, each fret represents one semitone in the standard western system, in which one octave is divided into twelve semitones. Fret is often used as a verb, meaning simply to press down the string behind a fret, fretting often refers to the frets and/or their system of placement. Pressing the string against the fret reduces the length of the string to that between the bridge and the next fret between the fretting finger and the bridge. This is damped if the string were stopped with the fingertip on a fretless fingerboard. Frets make it easier for a player to achieve an acceptable standard of intonation. Furthermore, a fretted fingerboard makes it easier to play chords accurately, a disadvantage of frets is that they restrict pitches to the temperament defined by the fret positions. A player may still influence intonation, however, by pulling the string to the side to increase string tension and this technique is often used by electric guitarists of all genres, and is an important part of sitar playing. On instruments with frets that are thicker off the fingerboard, string tension, sometimes a player can pull the string toward the bridge or nut, thus lowering or raising the string tension and pitch. However, except for instruments that accommodate extensive string pulling, like the sitar, since the intonation of most modern western fretted instruments is equal tempered, the ratio of the distances of two consecutive frets to the bridge is 212, or approximately 1.059463. Theoretically, the twelfth fret should divide the string in two exact halves, to compensate for the increase in string tension when the string is pressed against the frets, the bridge position is adjusted slightly so the 12th fret plays exactly in tune. Fan frets (also fanned frets, slanted frets, or multi-scale, Frets are generally perpendicular to the instruments neck centerline, on a fanned fretboard, the frets are angled with only one center fret perpendicular to the neck’s centerline. This gives the strings more length and the higher strings shorter length. The idea is to more accurate tuning and deeper bass. Some think that fanned frets might be more ergonomic, fanned frets first appeared on the 16th century Orpharion, a variant of the cittern, tuned like a lute. John Starrett revived the idea in the seventies on his innovative instrument
5.
Lute
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The European lute and the modern Near-Eastern oud descend from a common ancestor via diverging evolutionary paths. The lute is used in a variety of instrumental music from the Medieval to the late Baroque eras and was the most important instrument for secular music in the Renaissance. It is also an instrument, especially in vocal works. The player of a lute is called a lutenist, lutanist or lutist, the words lute and oud possibly derive from Arabic al-ʿud. Recent research by Eckhard Neubauer suggests ʿud may in turn be an Arabized version of the Persian name rud and it has equally been suggested the wood in the name may have distinguished the instrument by its wooden soundboard from skin-faced predecessors. Gianfranco Lotti suggests the wood appellation originally carried derogatory connotations because of proscriptions of all music in early Islam. Lutes are made almost entirely of wood, the soundboard is a teardrop-shaped thin flat plate of resonant wood. In all lutes the soundboard has a single decorated sound hole under the strings called the rose. The sound hole is not open, but rather covered with a grille in the form of a vine or a decorative knot. Robert Lundberg, in his book Historical Lute Construction, suggests ancient builders placed bars according to ratios of the scale length. He further suggests the inward bend of the soundboard is an adaptation by ancient builders to afford the lutenists right hand more space between the strings and soundboard. Soundboard thickness varies, but generally hovers between 1.5 and 2 mm, some luthiers tune the belly as they build, removing mass and adapting bracing to produce desirable sonic results. The lute belly is almost never finished, but in cases the luthier may size the top with a very thin coat of shellac or glair to help keep it clean. After joining the top to the sides, a half-binding is usually installed around the edge of the soundboard, the half-binding is approximately half the thickness of the soundboard and is usually made of a contrasting color wood. The rebate for the half-binding must be precise to avoid compromising structural integrity. The back or the shell is assembled from strips of hardwood called ribs. There are braces inside on the soundboard to give it strength, the neck is made of light wood, with a veneer of hardwood to provide durability for the fretboard beneath the strings. Unlike most modern stringed instruments, the fretboard is mounted flush with the top
6.
Musical instrument
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A musical instrument is an instrument created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument, the history of musical instruments dates to the beginnings of human culture. Early musical instruments may have used for ritual, such as a trumpet to signal success on the hunt. Cultures eventually developed composition and performance of melodies for entertainment, Musical instruments evolved in step with changing applications. The date and origin of the first device considered an instrument is disputed. The oldest object that some refer to as a musical instrument. Some consensus dates early flutes to about 37,000 years ago, many early musical instruments were made from animal skins, bone, wood, and other non-durable materials. Musical instruments developed independently in many populated regions of the world, however, contact among civilizations caused rapid spread and adaptation of most instruments in places far from their origin. By the Middle Ages, instruments from Mesopotamia were in maritime Southeast Asia, development in the Americas occurred at a slower pace, but cultures of North, Central, and South America shared musical instruments. By 1400, musical instrument development slowed in areas and was dominated by the Occident. Musical instrument classification is a discipline in its own right, Instruments can be classified by their effective range, their material composition, their size, etc. However, the most common method, Hornbostel-Sachs, uses the means by which they produce sound. The academic study of instruments is called organology. Once humans moved from making sounds with their bodies—for example, by using objects to create music from sounds. Primitive instruments were designed to emulate natural sounds, and their purpose was ritual rather than entertainment. The concept of melody and the pursuit of musical composition were unknown to early players of musical instruments. A player sounding a flute to signal the start of a hunt does so without thought of the notion of making music. Musical instruments are constructed in an array of styles and shapes
7.
Bouzouki
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A mainstay of modern Greek music, the front of the body is flat and is usually heavily inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The instrument is played with a plectrum and has a metallic sound, reminiscent of a mandolin. There are two types of bouzouki. The trichordo has three pairs of strings, and the tetrachordo has four pairs of strings and it is in the same instrumental family as the mandolin and the lute. The type of the instrument used in Rembetika music was a three-stringed instrument, the Greek bouzouki is a plucked musical instrument of the lute family, called the thabouras or tambouras family. The tambouras has existed in ancient Greece as pandoura, and can be found in sizes, shapes, depths of body, lengths of neck. The bouzouki and the baglamas are the direct descendants, the Greek marble relief, known as the Mantineia Base, dating from 330-320 BC, shows a muse playing a variant of the pandoura. From Byzantine times it was called pandouras and then tambouras, on display in the National Historical Museum of Greece is the tambouras of a hero of the Greek revolution of 1821, General Makriyiannis. Other sizes have appeared and include the Greek instrument tzouras, an instrument smaller in size than standard bouzouki, following the 1919–1922 war in Asia Minor and the subsequent exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey, the ethnic Greeks fled to Greece. The early bouzoukia were mostly three-string, with three courses and were tuned in different ways, as to the scale one wanted to play, at the end of the 1950s, four-course bouzoukia started to gain popularity. The four-course bouzouki was made popular by Manolis Chiotis, who used a tuning akin to standard guitar tuning. However it allowed for greater virtuosity and helped elevate the bouzouki into a popular instrument capable of a wide range of musical expression. Recently the 3 course bouzouki has gained in popularity, the first recording with the 4-course instrument was made in 1956. This is the style of bouzouki, introduced around 1900. It has fixed frets and 6 strings in three pairs, in the lower-pitched course, the pair consists of a thick wound string and a thin string, tuned an octave apart. The conventional modern tuning of the bouzouki is D3 D4•A3 A3•D4 D4. This tuning was called the European tuning by Markos Vamvakaris, who mentioned several other tunings, or douzenia, the illustrated bouzouki was made by Karolos Tsakirian of Athens, and is a replica of a trichordo bouzouki made by his grandfather for Markos Vamvakaris. The absence of the heavy mother-of-pearl ornamentation often seen on modern bouzoukia is typical of bouzoukia of the period and it has tuners for eight strings, but has only six strings, the neck being too narrow for eight
8.
Dotara
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The dotara is a two or four or some times five stringed musical instrument resembling more to mandolin than a guitar. It is commonly used in Assam, Bangladesh, West Bengal & Bihar, the equivalent as a traditional long-necked two-stringed lute is found in Central Asia as dutar. The dotara is the singlemost important folk instrument used in genres of folk music throughout the land of Bengal. It has two forms, the bangla and the bhawaiya. The bangla form originated in the Rahr Bangla region, where it is predominantly played. It has metal strings, which give it a brighter tone than other instruments played in the area, although a dotara can have 4-5 string, but every song you can play with the help of two main string. That is why its name is dotara, the bhawaiya form is almost extinct in contemporary times and has a more primeval beginning than its bangla cousin. Again the strings are its striking feature, being made of thick cotton, silk or more popularly of catgut. The dotara is a stringed, pluck instrument, played in an open note combination, widely accompanying the beat, the narrow neck serves as the finger-board —this is made of brass or steel and particularly lends the liquid form to the tonal quality. The sound box of the instrument is covered with a tightly stretched kidskin or lizard-skin, in fact, the dotara is a simpler version of sarod. However, the instrument can have as many as four strings or more. With four strings, the structure is as follows —Soh-Do-Do-Fah. The Indian notation would read as, Pa - Sa - Sa - Ma with Do/Sa being the note of the song. In Islam, Sirajul, Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia, National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh
9.
Dramyin
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It is often used in religious festivals of Tibetan Buddhism. The instrument is played by strumming, fingerpicking or plucking, the dramyen, chiwang, and lingm comprise the basic instrumental inventory for traditional Bhutanese folk music. The dramyin is a long-necked, double-waisted and fretless lute and it is usually hollowed out of a single piece of wood and can vary in size from 60 cm to 120 cm in length. Unlike a contemporary guitar, the dramyin does not have a sound hole in the wooden sounding board. Of its seven strings, or thag, only six continue to the pegbox, thus, six tuning pegs are located in the pegbox, while one is located in the neck itself. Strings were originally made from gut, but are presently made from synthetic material like nylon. The seven strings occur in two courses, and one triple course. These become three double courses by the time they reach the pegbox, traditional dramyins are equipped with a single bridge. Resonance is achieved with a taught, thick animal skin, certain older forms of the dramyin possessed sympathetic strings and under-strings to produce more resonance. Some dramyins come with an attached to the base for plucking. Plectrums were traditionally made of bone, but are now made of plastic or wood and it is often ornately and colourfully painted or carved with religious symbols and motifs, and its pegbox is often impressively carved into a C shape resembling a chusing, a type of sea monster. Tassels may be hung from the horns of the chusing to give the instrument a more frightening look, the triple course of the dramyin typically contains the half string on the left, which is usually tuned an octave above the middle unison strings. One of the two courses are typically tuned an octave apart. The courses are normally plucked in unison during playing, typically a single note is played at a time, making for melodic music and not harmony. Dramyins may also be played to time, in a rhythmic fashion. One standard tuning for the Dramyin is, g G c c c f f, the standard way of plucking a course is down and up. One of the two strings in the course is plucked in a motion, and the other in the upward motion. The downward motion is typically louder than the other and these are performed at religious festivals called tsechus - banned in Tibet, but continuing unabated in Bhutan much as they have been for the past four centuries
10.
Dutar
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The dutar is a traditional long-necked two-stringed lute found in Iran and Central Asia. Its name comes from the Persian word for two strings, دو تار dotār, although the Herati dutar of Afghanistan has fourteen strings, when played, the strings are usually plucked by the Uyghurs of Western China and strummed and plucked by the Tajiks, Turkmen, Uzbeks. Related instruments include the Kazakh dombra, the Dutar is also an important instrument among the Kurds of Khorasan amongst whom Haj Ghorban Soleimani of Quchan was a noted virtuoso. In Kormanji one who plays the dutar is known as a bakci, Khorasan bakhshi music is recognized on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. At the time of the Dutars humble origins in the 15th century as an instrument its strings were made from gut. However, with the opening up of the Silk Road, catgut gave way to strings made from twisted silk imported from China, to this day some instruments still feature silk strings, although nylon strings are also commonly used. The dutar has a warm, dulcet tone, typical sizes for the pear-shaped instrument range from one to two meters
11.
Setar
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The Setar is an Iranian musical instrument. It is a member of the family, which is played with the index finger of the right hand. Two and a half ago, a fourth string was added to the setar. It has 25 -27 moveable frets which are made of animal intestines or silk. It originated in Persia before the spread of Islam, the satar is an important instrument in 12 muqam
12.
Sitar
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The sitar is a plucked stringed instrument used mainly in Hindustani music and Indian classical music. The sitar flourished in the 16th and 17th centuries and arrived at its present form in 18th century India and it derives its distinctive timbre and resonance from sympathetic strings, bridge design, a long hollow neck and a gourd-shaped resonance chamber. In appearance, the sitar is similar to the tanpura, except that it has frets, used widely throughout the Indian subcontinent, the sitar became popularly known in the wider world through the works of Ravi Shankar, beginning in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The word sitar originally derived from Sanskrit words saptatantri veena, which later was called as saat taar which eventually became sitar, another source might be from Persian seh + tar, literally meaning three strings. The instrument is thought to have been a version of the Veena, another prominent instrument in Carnatic and Hindustani music, altered in order to conform with Mughal tastes. The sitar flourished in the 16th and 17th centuries and arrived at its present form in 18th century India, in his Bharatiya Sangeet Vadya, Lalmani Misra traces the instruments development from the Tritantri veena through the nibaddh and anibaddh Tamburas also called tanbur and later the jantra. Construction of the similar tanpura was described by Tansen, a sitar can have 18,19,20, or 21 strings. The frets are movable, allowing fine tuning, the Gandhaar-pancham sitar has six playable strings, whereas the Kharaj-pancham sitar, used in the Maihar gharana, to which Ravi Shankar belonged, and other gharanas such as Bishnupur, has seven. Three of these, called the chikaari, simply provide a drone, the instrument has two bridges, the large bridge for the playing and drone strings and the small bridge for the sympathetic strings. Its timbre results from the way the strings interact with the wide, as a string reverberates its length changes slightly as its edge touches the bridge, promoting the creation of overtones and giving the sound its distinctive tone. The maintenance of this specific tone by shaping the bridge is called jawari, many musicians rely on instrument makers to adjust this. The bridges are fixed to the resonating chamber, or kaddu. Some sitars have a resonator, the tumbaa, near the top of the hollow neck. Materials used in construction include teak wood or tun wood, which is a variation of mahogany, for the neck and faceplate, the instruments bridges are made of deer horn, ebony, or very occasionally from camel bone. Synthetic material is now common as well, there are three popular modern styles of sitar offered in a variety of sub-styles and decorative patterns. The two popular styles are the gayaki style sitars and the full decorated instrumental style sitars, the gayaki style sitar is mostly of seasoned toon wood, with very few or no carved decorations. It often has a dark polish, the inlay decorations are mostly of mother of pearl. The number of strings is often limited to eleven but may extend to thirteen
13.
Tambura (instrument)
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The tambura is a stringed instrument that is played as a folk instrument in Macedonia, Croatia and Bulgaria. It has doubled steel strings and is played with a plectrum, the Bulgarian tambura has 8 steel strings in 4 doubled courses. All the courses are tuned in unison, with no octaves and it is tuned D3 D3, G3 G3, B3 B3, E4 E4. It has a bridge and a metal tailpiece. The instrument body is carved from a single block of wood and is therefore quite heavy. The Macedonian tambura has 4 steel strings in 2 doubled courses and it is tuned A A, D D when playing melodies based on A tonic upon A drone. It also may be tuned G G, D D when playing melodies based on G tonic upon G drone, sometimes octave strings are used on the lower course. It has a bridge and a metal tailpeice. The instrument body is often made from staves like a lute. It is played with a plectrum, playing short tones which are plucked from the top down, while playing long tones with fast tremolo. For solo playing or to accompany a singer, they are played in the traditional manner, the more modern way, which is more used in orchestras or other groups, is to play single line melodies using all courses. Both varieties of tambura have a long, narrow neck with 18 or 20 frets, the frets are nowadays always arranged in the normal Western 12 note scale, although in the past the Farkas system was also used. The Bulgarian tamburas body is rather shallow and flat, whereas the Macedonia tambura has a more rounded. Instruments of the Tamburica orchestras The mandolin family The bouzouki Tambura The stringed instrument database Atlas of plucked instruments
14.
Tambouras
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The tambouras is a Greek traditional string instrument of Byzantine origin. It has existed since at least the 10th century, when it was known in Assyria, at that time, it might have between two and six strings, but Arabs adopted it, and called it a Tanbur. The characteristic long neck and two strings, tuned 5 notes apart and it also similar instrument Tambur in Turkish and each of them have same origin. It is considered that the ancestor is the ancient Greek pandouris, also known as pandoura, pandouros or pandourida. Since modern Greek words do not have a transliteration into the Latin alphabet. Even the final -s may be dropped at the transliteration, since it marks the nominative in Greek. Variations of the word are to be found in Greece, tsambouras, the word ταμπουράς comes from Turkish tambur from Arabic ṭanbūr or Persian tunbūra. The tambouras is a fretted instrument of the lute family, close to Turkish saz. It has movable frets that permit playing tunes in the Greek traditional modes and it was also known as Pandouris, Pandoura and Fandouros in the Byzantine Empire. When the tambouras was tempered, it gave rise to the bouzouki, which is, in fact, a recent development of the tambouras
15.
Tamburica
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Tamburica or Tamboura refers to a family of long-necked lutes popular in Southern Europe and Central Europe, especially Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia, and Hungary. It is also known in Burgenland, all took their name and some characteristics from the Persian tanbur but also resemble the mandolin and guitar in the sense that its strings are plucked and often paired. The frets may be moveable to allow the playing of various modes, the variety of tamburica shapes known today were developed in Croatia and Serbia by a number of indigenous contributors near the end of the 19th century. There is little reliable data showing how the tamboura entered Central Europe and it already existed during Byzantine Empire, and the Greeks and Slavs used to call pandouras or tambouras the ancestor of modern bouzouki. The instrument was referred to as θαμπούριν, thambourin in the Byzantine Empire, until the Great Migration of the Serbs at the end of the 17th century, the type of tamboura most frequently used in Croatia and Serbia had a long neck and two or three strings. Similar string instruments are the Czech bratsche, Turkish saz and the sargija, çiftelia and bouzouki. The oldest of the drum so far known, which is kept in a museum in Osijek, dates from 1847 and was owned by Pajo Kolarić of Osijek. According to him, today the festival called tamburitzan which is every year in Osijek. The development process of the tamburica was initiated by several Croatian citizens over a period of time. The original long neck, pear shaped tamburica was called the samica, the kontra,4 strings tuned in an upper A chord and used only as an accompaniment, originated in Dalmatia. After a rebellion in Bosnia had broken out, many arrived in Sremski Karlovci. Among these refugees was a man named Marko Capkun who brought two tamburas with him and he called the small one icitel and the larger one sarkija. These tambura did not use wire strings but rather gut strings pulled through little holes on the neck, a woodworker, Josif, in Sremski Karlovci began to make Markos tamburas but instead of the traditional pear shape, he made them into a shape of a tiny guitar. A bird catcher named Joza built a large tambura-much bigger than a guitar in 1877 or 1878 and it stretched two thicker and two thinner strings on it and Joza called it the bas or berdon. They developed and orchestra with a little tambura called the prima,5 kontra and 1 bas, dual-fifths system bears the name by Milutin Farkas Farkas system. This system initially consisted of the first and second bisernom, three brača, two of bugaria and berde, later, they have an even čelović and čelo. This two-part note fifths system was widespread in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia, Czechoslovakia, in the second half of the nineteenth century in Backa and Srem there was a two-part note fourths system, but it quickly grew into a Triple. Three-note fourths system developed in Backa late nineteenth century and it consisted of a first and second tamburitza, third and fourth tambura, the first and second brothers and the bass
16.
Turkish tambur
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The Tambur is a fretted string instrument of Turkey and the former lands of the Ottoman Empire. Like the ney, the armudi kemençe and the kudüm, it one of the four instruments of the basic quartet of Turkish classical music a. k. a. Of the two variants, one is played with a plectrum and the other with a bow, the player is called a tamburî. There are several hypotheses as to the origin of the instrument, one suggests that it descended from the kopuz, a string instrument still in use among the Turkic peoples of Central Asia and the Caspian region. The name itself derives from the tanbur, Tanbur in turn might have descended from the Sumerian pantur. In ancient Hittite texts, we come across a string instrument called tibula and this latter hypothesis could also account for the favor the instrument received in the Ottoman court vis-à-vis its rival, the oud. As of the 17th century, the tanbur had already taken its present form and structure, tamburs are made almost entirely of wood. The shell is assembled from strips of hardwood called ribs joined edge to edge to form a body for the instrument. The number of ribs traditionally amounts to 17,21 or 23, yet examples with slightly wider, traditionally, thinner strips called fileto are inserted between the ribs for ornamental purposes, but are not obligatory. Ribs are assembled on the wedge and the heel on which the fingerboard is mounted. The soundboard is a thin flat three-, two- or single-piece plate of resonant wood. This circular plate measuring about 30 to 35 cm in diameter is mounted on the bottom wedge, a soundhole is either wanting or consists of a very small unornamented opening, giving the instrument its peculiar sonority. The neck is a mince 100–110 cm long D-section fingerboard made of light wood, catgut frets are fixed on the neck by means of minute nails. The main bridge is trapezoidal and mobile, and since the shell lacks braces to support the soundboard, the smaller upper bridge between the pegbox and the neck is traditionally made of bone. The plectrum is made of tortoiseshell and is called bağa, cut in an asymmetrical V-form and polished at 45° on the tip, it measures 2-2.5 mm × 5–6 mm × 10–15 cm. Nowadays the tanbur has seven strings, in the past tanburs with eight strings were not uncommon. The yaylı tanbur has a physical appearance, although the shell -a nearly perfect semi-sphere- might be made of metal. It is played with a bow instead of a plectrum, the technique was introduced by Tanburi Cemil Bey in the end of the 19th century
17.
Tanpura
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The repeated cycle of plucking all strings creates the sonic canvas on which the melody of the raga is drawn. The name tanapura is derived from tana, referring to a phrase, and pura. Hindustani musicians favour the term tanpura whereas Carnatic musicians say tambura, concerning its history, A. D. Ranade states, The first unambiguous reference to the tanpura is in Sangeet Parijat. It is neither mentioned by the earlier texts nor does it find a place in sculptures, stephen Slawek notes that by the end of the 16th century, the tanpura had fully developed in its modern form, and was seen in the miniature paintings of the Mughals. Slawek further suggests that due to structural similarity the sitar and tanpura share a related history, a 2006 article in the performing arts magazine Sruti notes, Any model electronic tanpura produces a sound that is necessarily artificial, which is the opposite of artistic. The electronic substitute has no value and has nothing to teach us. The body shape of the tanpura somewhat resembles that of the sitar, one or more tanpuras may be used to accompany vocalists or instrumentalists. It has four or five strings, which are plucked one after another in a regular pattern to create a harmonic resonance on the basic notes of a key. Jiva refers to soul, that gives life, implying that the tanpura embodies an animated tone quality. To achieve this effect, the pass over a table-shaped, curved-top bridge. When a string is plucked, it has an intermittent periodical grazing contact with the bridge, when the string is plucked, it has a large amplitude. As the energy of the movement gradually diminishes, the contact point of the string with the bridge slowly creeps up the slope of the bridge. Depending on scale, tension and pitch, this can take three and ten seconds. Every single string produces its own cascading range of harmonics and, at the same time, according to this principle, tanpuras are attentively tuned to achieve a particular tonal shade relative to the tonal characteristics of the raga. Tanpuras come in different sizes and pitches, larger males, smaller females for vocalists, and these play at the octave so as not to drown out the soloists lower registers. One female singer may take her sa at F, another at A, sitariyas tune mostly around C#, sarodiyas around C, the male tanpura has an open string length of approximately one metre, the female is three-fourths of the male. The standard tuning is 5-8-8-1 or, in Indian sargam, pa-SA-SA-sa, for ragas that omit the fifth tone, pa, the first string is tuned down to the natural fourth, 4-8-8-1 or Ma-sa-sa-Sa. Some ragas require a common tuning with shuddh or komal NI, NI-sa-sa-SA or 7-8-8-1, or even with the 6th, Dha-s-s-S
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Tar (string instrument)
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Tar is an Iranian long-necked, waisted instrument, shared by many cultures and countries like Iran, Armenia, Georgia, Republic of Azerbaijan, and other areas near the Caucasus region. The word tār means string in Persian, though it might have the meaning in languages influenced by Persian. This has led some Iranian experts to hold that the Tar must be common among all the Iranian people as well as the territories that are named as Iranian Cultural Continuum by the Encyclopædia Iranica. This is claimed to be the root of the names of the Persian setar and the guitar as well as less widespread instruments such as the dutar and the Indian sitar. Though it was developed in the Persian Empire, the exact region in which it was first made. Tar is one of the most important musical instruments in Iran, the formation, compilation, edition, and inheritance of the most authentic and most comprehensive versions of radif are all worked on tar. The general trends of Persian classical music have deeply influenced by tar players. In 2012 art of Azerbaijani craftsmanship and performance art of the tar was added to the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, the tar appeared in its present form in the middle of the eighteenth century in Persia. The body is a double-bowl shape carved from wood, with a thin membrane of stretched lamb-skin covering the top. The fingerboard has twenty-five to twenty-eight adjustable gut frets, and there are three courses of strings. Its range is two and one-half octaves, and it is played with a small brass plectrum. The long and narrow neck has a flat fingerboard running level to the membrane and ends in an elaborate pegbox with six wooden tuning pegs of different dimensions, adding to the decorative effect. It has three courses of double singing strings, that are tuned in fourths plus one flying bass string that runs outside the fingerboard, every String has its own tuning peg and are tuned independently. The Persian tar used to have five strings, the sixth string was added to the tar by Darvish Khan. This string is todays fifth string of the Iranian tar, the melodies performed on tar were considered useful for headache, insomnia and melancholy, as well as for eliminating nervous and muscle spasms. Listening to this instrument was believed to induce a quiet and philosophical mood and its solemn melodies were thought to cause a person to relax and fall asleep. The author of Qabusnameh recommends that when selecting musical tones, to take account the temperament of the listener. The tar features prominently in Jeff Waynes Musical Version of The War of the Worlds, in the section Horsell Common, george Fenton played it on the original album, and Gaetan Schurrer can be seen playing one on the DVD of the 2006 production
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Mesopotamia
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In the Iron Age, it was controlled by the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. The Sumerians and Akkadians dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of history to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. It fell to Alexander the Great in 332 BC, and after his death, around 150 BC, Mesopotamia was under the control of the Parthian Empire. Mesopotamia became a battleground between the Romans and Parthians, with parts of Mesopotamia coming under ephemeral Roman control. In AD226, eastern part of it fell to the Sassanid Persians, division of Mesopotamia between Roman and Sassanid Empires lasted until the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia of the Sasanian Empire and Muslim conquest of the Levant from Byzantines. A number of primarily neo-Assyrian and Christian native Mesopotamian states existed between the 1st century BC and 3rd century AD, including Adiabene, Osroene, and Hatra, Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. The regional toponym Mesopotamia comes from the ancient Greek root words μέσος middle and ποταμός river and it is used throughout the Greek Septuagint to translate the Hebrew equivalent Naharaim. In the Anabasis, Mesopotamia was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria, the Aramaic term biritum/birit narim corresponded to a similar geographical concept. The neighbouring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia. A further distinction is made between Northern or Upper Mesopotamia and Southern or Lower Mesopotamia. Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazira, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad, Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf and includes Kuwait and parts of western Iran. In modern academic usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation and it is usually used to designate the area until the Muslim conquests, with names like Syria, Jazirah, and Iraq being used to describe the region after that date. It has been argued that these later euphemisms are Eurocentric terms attributed to the region in the midst of various 19th-century Western encroachments, Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, both of which have their headwaters in the Armenian Highlands. Both rivers are fed by tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the north which gives way to a 15,000 square kilometres region of marshes, lagoons, mud flats, in the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex water-borne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times, periodic breakdowns in the cultural system have occurred for a number of reasons. Alternatively, military vulnerability to invasion from marginal hill tribes or nomadic pastoralists has led to periods of trade collapse and these trends have continued to the present day in Iraq
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South Asia
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Topographically, it is dominated by the Indian Plate, which rises above sea level as Nepal and northern parts of India situated south of the Himalayas and the Hindu Kush. South Asia is bounded on the south by the Indian Ocean and on land by West Asia, Central Asia, East Asia, the current territories of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka form the countries of South Asia. The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation is an economic cooperation organisation in the region which was established in 1985, South Asia covers about 5.1 million km², which is 11. 51% of the Asian continent or 3. 4% of the worlds land surface area. The population of South Asia is about 1.749 billion or about one fourth of the worlds population, overall, it accounts for about 39. 49% of Asias population and is home to a vast array of peoples. The area of South Asia and its extent is not clear cut as systemic. Aside from the region of South Asia, formerly part of the British Empire, there is a high degree of variation as to which other countries are included in South Asia. Modern definitions of South Asia are consistent in including Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar is included by some scholars in South Asia, but in Southeast Asia by others. Some do not include Afghanistan, others question whether Afghanistan should be considered a part of South Asia or the Middle East, the mountain countries of Nepal and Bhutan, and the island countries of Sri Lanka and Maldives are generally included as well. Myanmar is often added, and by various deviating definitions based on often substantially different reasons, the British Indian Ocean Territory, the common concept of South Asia is largely inherited from the administrative boundaries of the British Raj, with several exceptions. The Aden Colony, British Somaliland and Singapore, though administered at various times under the Raj, have not been proposed as any part of South Asia. Additionally Burma was administered as part of the Raj until 1937, the 562 princely states that were protected by but not directly ruled by the Raj became administrative parts of South Asia upon joining Union of India or Dominion of Pakistan. China and Myanmar have also applied for the status of members of SAARC. This bloc of countries include two independent countries that were not part of the British Raj – Nepal, and Bhutan, Afghanistan was a British protectorate from 1878 until 1919, after the Afghans lost to the British in the Second Anglo-Afghan war. The United Nations Statistics Divisions scheme of sub-regions include all eight members of the SAARC as part of Southern Asia, population Information Network includes Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burma, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as part of South Asia. Maldives, in view of its characteristics, was admitted as a member Pacific POPIN subregional network only in principle, the Hirschman–Herfindahl index of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific for the region includes only the original seven signatories of SAARC. The British Indian Ocean Territory is connected to the region by a publication of Janes for security considerations, the inclusion of Myanmar in South Asia is without consensus, with many considering it a part of southeast Asia and others including it within South Asia. Afghanistan was of importance to the British colonial empire, especially after the Second Anglo-Afghan War over 1878–1880, Afghanistan remained a British protectorate until 1919, when a treaty with Vladimir Lenin included the granting of independence to Afghanistan. Following Indias partition, Afghanistan has generally included in South Asia
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Central Asia
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Central Asia stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to China in the east and from Afghanistan in the south to Russia in the north. It is also referred to as the -stans as the five countries generally considered to be within the region all have names ending with the Persian suffix -stan. Central Asias five former Soviet republics are Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Central Asia has historically been closely tied to its nomadic peoples and the Silk Road. It has acted as a crossroads for the movement of people, goods, the Silk Road connected Muslim lands with the people of Europe, India, and China. This crossroads position has intensified the conflict between tribalism and traditionalism and modernization, in pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, Central Asia was predominantly Iranian, peopled by Eastern Iranian-speaking Bactrians, Sogdians and Chorasmians and the semi-nomadic Scythians and Parthians. Central Asia is sometimes referred to as Turkestan, the idea of Central Asia as a distinct region of the world was introduced in 1843 by the geographer Alexander von Humboldt. The borders of Central Asia are subject to multiple definitions, historically built political geography and geoculture are two significant parameters widely used in the scholarly literature about the definitions of the Central Asia. The most limited definition was the one of the Soviet Union. This definition was also used outside the USSR during this period. However, the Russian culture has two terms, Средняя Азия and Центральная Азия. Since then, this has become the most common definition of Central Asia, the UNESCO general history of Central Asia, written just before the collapse of the USSR, defines the region based on climate and uses far larger borders. An alternative method is to define the region based on ethnicity and these areas include Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the Turkic regions of southern Siberia, the five republics, and Afghan Turkestan. Afghanistan as a whole, the northern and western areas of Pakistan, the Tibetans and Ladakhi are also included. Insofar, most of the peoples are considered the indigenous peoples of the vast region. Central Asia is a large region of varied geography, including high passes and mountains, vast deserts. The vast steppe areas of Central Asia are considered together with the steppes of Eastern Europe as a geographical zone known as the Eurasian Steppe. Much of the land of Central Asia is too dry or too rugged for farming, the Gobi desert extends from the foot of the Pamirs, 77° E, to the Great Khingan Mountains, 116°–118° E. Central Asia has the following geographic extremes, The worlds northernmost desert, at Buurug Deliin Els, Mongolia, the Northern Hemispheres southernmost permafrost, at Erdenetsogt sum, Mongolia, 46°17′ N
22.
Iran
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Iran, also known as Persia, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, is a sovereign state in Western Asia. Comprising a land area of 1,648,195 km2, it is the second-largest country in the Middle East, with 82.8 million inhabitants, Iran is the worlds 17th-most-populous country. It is the country with both a Caspian Sea and an Indian Ocean coastline. The countrys central location in Eurasia and Western Asia, and its proximity to the Strait of Hormuz, Tehran is the countrys capital and largest city, as well as its leading economic and cultural center. Iran is the site of to one of the worlds oldest civilizations, the area was first unified by the Iranian Medes in 625 BC, who became the dominant cultural and political power in the region. The empire collapsed in 330 BC following the conquests of Alexander the Great, under the Sassanid Dynasty, Iran again became one of the leading powers in the world for the next four centuries. Beginning in 633 AD, Arabs conquered Iran and largely displaced the indigenous faiths of Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism by Islam, Iran became a major contributor to the Islamic Golden Age that followed, producing many influential scientists, scholars, artists, and thinkers. During the 18th century, Iran reached its greatest territorial extent since the Sassanid Empire, through the late 18th and 19th centuries, a series of conflicts with Russia led to significant territorial losses and the erosion of sovereignty. Popular unrest culminated in the Persian Constitutional Revolution of 1906, which established a monarchy and the countrys first legislative body. Following a coup instigated by the U. K. Growing dissent against foreign influence and political repression led to the 1979 Revolution, Irans rich cultural legacy is reflected in part by its 21 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the third-largest number in Asia and 11th-largest in the world. Iran is a member of the UN, ECO, NAM, OIC. Its political system is based on the 1979 Constitution which combines elements of a democracy with a theocracy governed by Islamic jurists under the concept of a Supreme Leadership. A multicultural country comprising numerous ethnic and linguistic groups, most inhabitants are Shia Muslims, the largest ethnic groups in Iran are the Persians, Azeris, Kurds and Lurs. Historically, Iran has been referred to as Persia by the West, due mainly to the writings of Greek historians who called Iran Persis, meaning land of the Persians. As the most extensive interactions the Ancient Greeks had with any outsider was with the Persians, however, Persis was originally referred to a region settled by Persians in the west shore of Lake Urmia, in the 9th century BC. The settlement was then shifted to the end of the Zagros Mountains. In 1935, Reza Shah requested the international community to refer to the country by its native name, opposition to the name change led to the reversal of the decision, and Professor Ehsan Yarshater, editor of Encyclopædia Iranica, propagated a move to use Persia and Iran interchangeably
23.
India
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India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and it is bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast. It shares land borders with Pakistan to the west, China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the northeast, in the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Indias Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a border with Thailand. The Indian subcontinent was home to the urban Indus Valley Civilisation of the 3rd millennium BCE, in the following millennium, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism began to be composed. Social stratification, based on caste, emerged in the first millennium BCE, early political consolidations took place under the Maurya and Gupta empires, the later peninsular Middle Kingdoms influenced cultures as far as southeast Asia. In the medieval era, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived, much of the north fell to the Delhi sultanate, the south was united under the Vijayanagara Empire. The economy expanded in the 17th century in the Mughal empire, in the mid-18th century, the subcontinent came under British East India Company rule, and in the mid-19th under British crown rule. A nationalist movement emerged in the late 19th century, which later, under Mahatma Gandhi, was noted for nonviolent resistance, in 2015, the Indian economy was the worlds seventh largest by nominal GDP and third largest by purchasing power parity. Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India became one of the major economies and is considered a newly industrialised country. However, it continues to face the challenges of poverty, corruption, malnutrition, a nuclear weapons state and regional power, it has the third largest standing army in the world and ranks sixth in military expenditure among nations. India is a constitutional republic governed under a parliamentary system. It is a pluralistic, multilingual and multi-ethnic society and is home to a diversity of wildlife in a variety of protected habitats. The name India is derived from Indus, which originates from the Old Persian word Hindu, the latter term stems from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which was the historical local appellation for the Indus River. The ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi, which translates as The people of the Indus, the geographical term Bharat, which is recognised by the Constitution of India as an official name for the country, is used by many Indian languages in its variations. Scholars believe it to be named after the Vedic tribe of Bharatas in the second millennium B. C. E and it is also traditionally associated with the rule of the legendary emperor Bharata. Gaṇarājya is the Sanskrit/Hindi term for republic dating back to the ancient times, hindustan is a Persian name for India dating back to the 3rd century B. C. E. It was introduced into India by the Mughals and widely used since then and its meaning varied, referring to a region that encompassed northern India and Pakistan or India in its entirety
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Iraqi Kurdistan
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Iraqi Kurdistan, officially called the Kurdistan Region by the Iraqi constitution, is located in the north of Iraq and constitutes the countrys only autonomous region. The region is governed by the Kurdistan Regional Government, with the capital being Erbil. Kurdistan is a democracy with its own regional Parliament that consists of 111 seats. Masoud Barzani, who was elected as president in 2005, was re-elected in 2009. In August 2013 the parliament extended his presidency for two years. His presidency concluded on 19 August 2015 after the parties failed to reach an agreement over extending his term. The new Constitution of Iraq defines the Kurdistan Region as an entity of Iraq. The four governorates of Duhok, Hawler, Silemani, and Halabja comprise around 41,710 square kilometres and have a population of 5.5 million. In 2014, during the 2014 Iraq Crisis, Iraqi Kurdistans forces also took much of the disputed territories of Northern Iraq. The establishment of the Kurdistan Region dates back to the March 1970 autonomy agreement between the Kurdish opposition and the Iraqi government after years of heavy fighting, further, the 1980–88 Iran–Iraq War, especially the Iraqi Armys Al-Anfal Campaign, devastated the population and environment of Iraqi Kurdistan. As Kurds continued to fight government troops, Iraqi forces finally left Kurdistan in October 1991, in 1992, the major political parties in the region, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, established the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government. The 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent political changes led to the ratification of a new constitution in 2005, the name Kurdistan literally means Land of the Kurds. The suffix -stan is Iranian for place of or country, in English translations of the Constitution of Iraq, it is called Kurdistan, four times in the phrase region of Kurdistan and once in the phrase Kurdistan region. The regional government calls it the Kurdistan Region, the full name of the government is the Kurdistan Regional Government, abbreviated KRG. Kurds also refer to the region as Başûrê Kurdistanê or Başûrî Kurdistan, during the Baath Party administration in the 1970s and 1980s, the region was called the Kurdish Autonomous Region. The Kurdistan Region is largely mountainous, with the highest point being a 3,611 m point known locally as Cheekha Dar, the mountains are part of the larger Zagros mountain range which also extends into Iran. There are many rivers running through the region, which is distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water, the Great Zab and the Little Zab flow from the east to the west in the region. The Tigris river enters Iraqi Kurdistan from Turkish Kurdistan, the mountainous nature of Iraqi Kurdistan, the difference of temperatures in its various parts, and its wealth of waters make it a land of agriculture and tourism
25.
Afghanistan
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Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located within South Asia and Central Asia. It has a population of approximately 32 million, making it the 42nd most populous country in the world. It is bordered by Pakistan in the south and east, Iran in the west, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan in the north and its territory covers 652,000 km2, making it the 41st largest country in the world. The land also served as the source from which the Kushans, Hephthalites, Samanids, Saffarids, Ghaznavids, Ghorids, Khiljis, Mughals, Hotaks, Durranis, the political history of the modern state of Afghanistan began with the Hotak and Durrani dynasties in the 18th century. In the late 19th century, Afghanistan became a state in the Great Game between British India and the Russian Empire. Following the Third Anglo-Afghan War in 1919, King Amanullah unsuccessfully attempted to modernize the country and it remained peaceful during Zahir Shahs forty years of monarchy. A series of coups in the 1970s was followed by a series of wars that devastated much of Afghanistan. The name Afghānistān is believed to be as old as the ethnonym Afghan, the root name Afghan was used historically in reference to a member of the ethnic Pashtuns, and the suffix -stan means place of in Persian. Therefore, Afghanistan translates to land of the Afghans or, more specifically in a historical sense, however, the modern Constitution of Afghanistan states that he word Afghan shall apply to every citizen of Afghanistan. An important site of historical activities, many believe that Afghanistan compares to Egypt in terms of the historical value of its archaeological sites. The country sits at a unique nexus point where numerous civilizations have interacted and it has been home to various peoples through the ages, among them the ancient Iranian peoples who established the dominant role of Indo-Iranian languages in the region. At multiple points, the land has been incorporated within large regional empires, among them the Achaemenid Empire, the Macedonian Empire, the Indian Maurya Empire, and the Islamic Empire. Archaeological exploration done in the 20th century suggests that the area of Afghanistan has been closely connected by culture and trade with its neighbors to the east, west. Artifacts typical of the Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze, urban civilization is believed to have begun as early as 3000 BCE, and the early city of Mundigak may have been a colony of the nearby Indus Valley Civilization. More recent findings established that the Indus Valley Civilisation stretched up towards modern-day Afghanistan, making the ancient civilisation today part of Pakistan, Afghanistan, in more detail, it extended from what today is northwest Pakistan to northwest India and northeast Afghanistan. An Indus Valley site has found on the Oxus River at Shortugai in northern Afghanistan. There are several smaller IVC colonies to be found in Afghanistan as well, after 2000 BCE, successive waves of semi-nomadic people from Central Asia began moving south into Afghanistan, among them were many Indo-European-speaking Indo-Iranians. These tribes later migrated further into South Asia, Western Asia, the region at the time was referred to as Ariana
26.
Pakistan
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Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a federal parliamentary republic in South Asia on the crossroads of Central Asia and Western Asia. It is the sixth-most populous country with a population exceeding 200 million people, in terms of area, it is the 33rd-largest country in the world with an area covering 881,913 square kilometres. It is separated from Tajikistan by Afghanistans narrow Wakhan Corridor in the north, Pakistan is unique among Muslim countries in that it is the only country to have been created in the name of Islam. As a result of the Pakistan Movement led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and it is an ethnically and linguistically diverse country, with a similarly diverse geography and wildlife. Initially a dominion, Pakistan adopted a constitution in 1956, becoming an Islamic republic, an ethnic civil war in 1971 resulted in the secession of East Pakistan as the new country of Bangladesh. The new constitution stipulated that all laws were to conform to the injunctions of Islam as laid down in the Quran. Pakistan has an economy with a well-integrated agriculture sector. The Pakistani economy is the 24th-largest in the world in terms of purchasing power and it is ranked among the emerging and growth-leading economies of the world, and is backed by one of the worlds largest and fastest-growing middle classes. The post-independence history of Pakistan has been characterised by periods of military rule, the country continues to face challenging problems such as illiteracy, healthcare, and corruption, but has substantially reduced poverty and terrorism and expanded per capita income. It is also a member of CERN. Pakistan is a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol, the Paris Agreement, the name Pakistan literally means land of the pure in Urdu and Persian. It is a play on the word pāk meaning pure in Persian and Pashto, the letter i was incorporated to ease pronunciation and form the linguistically correct and meaningful name. Some of the earliest ancient human civilisations in South Asia originated from areas encompassing present-day Pakistan, the earliest known inhabitants in the region were Soanian during the Lower Paleolithic, of whom stone tools have been found in the Soan Valley of Punjab. The Vedic Civilization, characterised by Indo-Aryan culture, laid the foundations of Hinduism, Multan was an important Hindu pilgrimage centre. The Vedic civilisation flourished in the ancient Gandhāran city of Takṣaśilā, the Indo-Greek Kingdom founded by Demetrius of Bactria included Gandhara and Punjab and reached its greatest extent under Menander, prospering the Greco-Buddhist culture in the region. Taxila had one of the earliest universities and centres of education in the world. At its zenith, the Rai Dynasty of Sindh ruled this region, the Pala Dynasty was the last Buddhist empire, which, under Dharampala and Devapala, stretched across South Asia from what is now Bangladesh through Northern India to Pakistan. The Arab conqueror Muhammad bin Qasim conquered the Indus valley from Sindh to Multan in southern Punjab in 711 AD, the Pakistan governments official chronology identifies this as the time when the foundation of Pakistan was laid
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Turkey
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Turkey, officially the Republic of Turkey, is a transcontinental country in Eurasia, mainly in Anatolia in Western Asia, with a smaller portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. Turkey is a democratic, secular, unitary, parliamentary republic with a cultural heritage. The country is encircled by seas on three sides, the Aegean Sea is to the west, the Black Sea to the north, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. The Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles, Ankara is the capital while Istanbul is the countrys largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Approximately 70-80% of the countrys citizens identify themselves as ethnic Turks, other ethnic groups include legally recognised and unrecognised minorities. Kurds are the largest ethnic minority group, making up approximately 20% of the population, the area of Turkey has been inhabited since the Paleolithic by various ancient Anatolian civilisations, as well as Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians and Armenians. After Alexander the Greats conquest, the area was Hellenized, a process continued under the Roman Empire. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, the empire reached the peak of its power in the 16th century, especially during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. During the war, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian, following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states. Turkey is a member of the UN, an early member of NATO. Turkeys growing economy and diplomatic initiatives have led to its recognition as a regional power while her location has given it geopolitical, the name of Turkey is based on the ethnonym Türk. The first recorded use of the term Türk or Türük as an autonym is contained in the Old Turkic inscriptions of the Göktürks of Central Asia, the English name Turkey first appeared in the late 14th century and is derived from Medieval Latin Turchia. Similarly, the medieval Khazar Empire, a Turkic state on the shores of the Black. The medieval Arabs referred to the Mamluk Sultanate as al-Dawla al-Turkiyya, the Ottoman Empire was sometimes referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its European contemporaries. The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world, various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family, in fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty years ago. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date, the settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age
28.
Tajikestan
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Tajikistan, officially the Republic of Tajikistan, is a mountainous, landlocked country in Central Asia with an estimated 8 million people in 2013, and an area of 143,100 km2. It is bordered by Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to the south, the Republic of Uzbekistan to the west, the Kyrgyz Republic to the north, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan lies to the south, separated by the narrow Wakhan Corridor. Traditional homelands of Tajik people included present-day Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan, a civil war was fought almost immediately after independence, lasting from 1992 to 1997. Since the end of the war, newly established political stability, Tajikistan is a presidential republic consisting of four provinces. Most of Tajikistans 8 million people belong to the Tajik ethnic group, many Tajiks also speak Russian as their second language. Mountains cover more than 90% of the country and it has a transition economy that is highly dependent on remittances, aluminium and cotton production. Tajikistan means the Land of the Tajiks, the suffix -stan is Persian for place of or country and Tajik is, most likely, the name of a pre-Islamic tribe. Tajikistan appeared as Tadjikistan or Tadzhikistan in English prior to 1991 and this is due to a transliteration from the Russian, Таджикистан. In Russian, there is no single letter j to represent the phoneme /ʤ/ and дж, Tadzhikistan is the most common alternate spelling and is widely used in English literature derived from Russian sources. Tadjikistan is the spelling in French and can occasionally be found in English language texts, the way of writing Tajikistan in the Perso-Arabic script is. The earliest recorded history of the dates back to about 500 BCE when much, if not all. After the regions conquest by Alexander the Great it became part of the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom, northern Tajikistan was part of Sogdia, a collection of city-states which was overrun by Scythians and Yuezhi nomadic tribes around 150 BCE. The Silk Road passed through the region and following the expedition of Chinese explorer Zhang Qian during the reign of Wudi commercial relations between Han China and Sogdiana flourished. Sogdians played a role in facilitating trade and also worked in other capacities, as farmers, carpetweavers, glassmakers. Later the Hephthalite Empire, a collection of tribes, moved into the region. Central Asia continued in its role as a crossroads, linking China, the steppes to the north. It was temporarily under the control of the Tibetan empire and Chinese from 650–680, the Samanid Empire,819 to 999, restored Persian control of the region and enlarged the cities of Samarkand and Bukhara which became the cultural centres of Iran and the region was known as Khorasan. The Kara-Khanid Khanate conquered Transoxania and ruled between 999–1211, during Genghis Khans invasion of Khwarezmia in the early 13th century the Mongol Empire took control over nearly all of Central Asia
29.
Kazakhstan
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Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in northern Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Kazakhstan is the worlds largest landlocked country, and the ninth largest in the world, Kazakhstan is the dominant nation of Central Asia economically, generating 60% of the regions GDP, primarily through its oil/gas industry. It also has vast mineral resources, Kazakhstan is officially a democratic, secular, unitary, constitutional republic with a diverse cultural heritage. Kazakhstan shares borders with Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, the terrain of Kazakhstan includes flatlands, steppe, taiga, rock canyons, hills, deltas, snow-capped mountains, and deserts. Kazakhstan has an estimated 18 million people as of 2014, Given its large area, its population density is among the lowest. The capital is Astana, where it was moved in 1997 from Almaty, the territory of Kazakhstan has historically been inhabited by nomadic tribes. This changed in the 13th century, when Genghis Khan occupied the country as part of the Mongolian Empire, following internal struggles among the conquerors, power eventually reverted to the nomads. By the 16th century, the Kazakh emerged as a distinct group, the Russians began advancing into the Kazakh steppe in the 18th century, and by the mid-19th century, they nominally ruled all of Kazakhstan as part of the Russian Empire. Following the 1917 Russian Revolution, and subsequent civil war, the territory of Kazakhstan was reorganised several times, in 1936, it was made the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, part of the Soviet Union. Kazakhstan was the last of the Soviet republics to declare independence during the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, Kazakhstan has worked to develop its economy, especially its dominant hydrocarbon industry. Kazakhstans 131 ethnicities include Kazakhs, Russians, Uzbeks, Ukrainians, Germans, Tatars, the Kazakh language is the state language, and Russian has equal official status for all levels of administrative and institutional purposes. The name Kazakh comes from the ancient Turkic word qaz, to wander, the name Cossack is of the same origin. The Persian suffix -stan means land or place of, so Kazakhstan can be translated as land of the wanderers. Kazakhstan has been inhabited since the Neolithic Age, the regions climate, archaeologists believe that humans first domesticated the horse in the regions vast steppes. Central Asia was originally inhabited by the Scythians, the Cuman entered the steppes of modern-day Kazakhstan around the early 11th century, where they later joined with the Kipchak and established the vast Cuman-Kipchak confederation. Under the Mongol Empire, the largest in history, administrative districts were established. These eventually came under the rule of the emergent Kazakh Khanate, throughout this period, traditional nomadic life and a livestock-based economy continued to dominate the steppe. Nevertheless, the region was the focus of ever-increasing disputes between the native Kazakh emirs and the neighbouring Persian-speaking peoples to the south, at its height the Khanate would rule parts of Central Asia and control Cumania
30.
Uzbekistan
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Uzbekistan, officially the Republic of Uzbekistan, is one of only two doubly landlocked countries in the world. Located in Central Asia, it is a unitary, constitutional, presidential republic, comprising twelve provinces, one autonomous republic and a capital city. Uzbekistan is bordered by five landlocked countries, Kazakhstan to the north, Tajikistan to the southeast, Kyrgyzstan to the northeast, Afghanistan to the south, and Turkmenistan to the southwest. Once part of the Turkic Khaganate and later Timurid Empires, the region that includes the Republic of Uzbekistan was conquered in the early 16th century by Eastern Turkic-speaking nomads. Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, it declared independence as the Republic of Uzbekistan on 31 August 1991, Uzbekistan is officially a democratic, secular, unitary, constitutional republic with a diverse cultural heritage. The countrys official language is Uzbek, a Turkic language written in the Latin alphabet and spoken natively by approximately 85% of the population, however, Uzbeks constitute 81% of the population, followed by Russians, Tajiks, Kazakhs, and others. A majority of Uzbeks are non-denominational Muslims, Uzbekistan is a member of the Commonwealth of Independent States, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, UN, and the SCO. While officially a republic, non-governmental human rights organizations define Uzbekistan as an authoritarian state with limited civil rights. Uzbekistans economy relies mainly on commodity production, including cotton, gold, uranium, despite the declared objective of transition to a market economy, its government continues to maintain economic controls which imports in favour of domestic import substitution. Uzbekistan has an area of 447,400 square kilometres and it is the 56th largest country in the world by area and the 42nd by population. Among the CIS countries, it is the 4th largest by area, Uzbekistan lies between latitudes 37° and 46° N, and longitudes 56° and 74° E. It stretches 1,425 kilometres from west to east and 930 kilometres from north to south, Uzbekistan also shares a short border with Afghanistan to the south. Uzbekistan is a dry, landlocked country and it is one of two doubly landlocked countries in the world, the other being Liechtenstein. In addition, due to its location within a series of endorheic basins, less than 10% of its territory is intensively cultivated irrigated land in river valleys and oases. The rest is vast desert and mountains, the climate in the Republic of Uzbekistan is continental, with little precipitation expected annually. The average summer high temperature tends to be 40 °C, while the winter low temperature is around −23 °C. Uzbekistan has a rich and diverse natural environment, the Aral Sea used to be the fourth-largest inland sea on Earth, acting as an influencing factor in the air moisture and arid land use. Since the 1960s, the decade when the misuse of the Aral Sea water began, it has shrunk to less than 50% of its former area, reliable, or even approximate data, have not been collected, stored or provided by any organization or official agency
31.
Ney
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The ney, is an end-blown flute that figures prominently in Middle Eastern music. In some of musical traditions, it is the only wind instrument used. The ney has been played continuously for 4, 500–5,000 years, the Persian ney consists of a hollow cylinder with finger-holes. Sometimes a brass, horn, or plastic mouthpiece is placed at the top to protect the wood from damage, the ney consists of a piece of hollow cane or giant reed with five or six finger holes and one thumb hole. Modern neys may be instead of metal or plastic tubing. The pitch of the ney varies depending on the region and the finger arrangement, in Romanian, the word nai is also applied to a curved pan flute while an end-blown flute resembling the Arab ney is referred to as caval. The typical Persian ney has 6 holes, one of which is on the back, Arabic and Turkish neys normally have 7 holes,6 in front and one thumb-hole in the back. The interval between the holes is a semitone, although microtones are achieved via partial hole-covering, changes of embouchure, microtonal inflection is common and crucial to various traditions of taqsim. Neys are constructed in various keys, advanced players will typically own a set of several neys in various keys, although it is possible to play fully chromatically on any instrument. Gargy-tuyduk this is a reed flute whose origin, according to legend, is connected with Alexander of Macedonia. The sound of the gargy-tuyduk has much in common with the two-voiced kargyra, during the playing of the gargy-tuyduk the melody is clearly heard, while the lower droning sound is barely audible. The allay epic songs have been described by the Turkologist N. Baskakov who divides them into three types, a) Kutilep kayla, in which the second sound is a light drone. B) Sygyrtzip kayla, with a whistling sound like the sound of a flute. C) Kargyrlap kayla, in which the sound can be defined as hissing. The sound of the Turkmen gargy-tuyduk is most like the Altay Kargyrkip kayla, the garg-tuyduk can have six finger holes and a length of 780 mm or five finger holes and a length of 550 mm. The range of the garg-tuyduk includes three registers, 1) The lowest register – non-working – is not used during the playing of a melody, 2) The same as on the non-working register but an octave higher. 3) High register from mi of the octave to ti. The Pamiri nay is a flute made of wood or, in Eastern Badakhshan
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Santur
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The santur is a hammered dulcimer of Mesopotamian origin. It is a trapezoid box zither with a body and ninety two steel strings. The strings, tuned to the pitch in groups of four, are struck with two wooden mallets called midhrab. The tuning of these sets of strings extends from the lower yakah up to jawab jawab husayni. The bridges are called dama because they look like pawns and it is also thought that the name is derived from Sant- Ur, meaning sound of Ur in Sumerian. It is native to Iraq, India, Pakistan, Turkey and it is the main instrument used in the classical Maqam al-iraqi tradition along with the Iraqi spike fiddle joza. The instrument was brought to Europe by the Arabs through North Africa and Spain during the Middle Ages, the Iraqi santur has, since its inception, been fully chromatic allowing for full maqam modulations. It uses 12 bridges of steel strings on both sides, and has three bridges, B half flat qaraar, E half flat and B half flat jawaab. The non-standard version of the Iraqi santur includes extra bridges so that no need to move those three bridges. However, playing it is a bit harder than playing the standard 12-bridge santur, for a video demonstration, see Wesam al-Azzawys video links in the sections below. The santur was invented in Mesopotamia and this instrument was traded and traveled to different parts of the middle east and each country customized and designed their own versions to adapt to their musical scales and tunings. The original santur was made with bark, stones and stringed with goat intestines. The Mesopotamian santur is also the father of the harp, the Chinese yangqin, the harpsichord, the qanun, the cimbalom, the Music of the Arabs, trans. Childrens Book of Music ISBN 978-0-7566-6734-4 Duchesne-Guillemin, Marcelle, sur la restitution de la musique hourrite. A Hurrian Musical Score from Ugarit, The Discovery of Mesopotamian Music, Sources from the Ancient Near East, the Origin of Music, A Theory of the Universal Development of Music. Revue dassyriologie et darchéologie orientale 64, no, the Discovery of an Ancient Mesopotamian Theory of Music. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 115, 131–49, the Cult Song with Music from Ancient Ugarit, Another Interpretation. Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie 8, edited by Dietz Otto Edzard, the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell
33.
Akkadian Empire
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The empire united all the Akkadian and Sumerian speakers under one rule. The Akkadian Empire controlled Mesopotamia, the Levant, and eastern and southern parts of Anatolia and Iran, sending military expeditions as far south as Dilmun and Magan in the Arabian Peninsula. During the 3rd millennium BC, there developed an intimate cultural symbiosis between the Sumerians and the Akkadians, which included widespread bilingualism. Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as a spoken language somewhere between the 3rd and the 2nd millennia BC, the Akkadian Empire reached its political peak between the 24th and 22nd centuries BC, following the conquests by its founder Sargon of Akkad. Under Sargon and his successors, the Akkadian language was imposed on neighboring conquered states such as Elam. Akkad is sometimes regarded as the first empire in history, though there are earlier Sumerian claimants, the Bible refers to Akkad in Genesis 10,10, which states that the beginning of Nimrods kingdom was in the land of Akkad. Nimrod is a Hebrew name not attested in Mesopotamians sources, many have pointed out similarities with the legend of Gilgamesh who founded Uruk, which is said to be the city Nimrod came to power. Today, some 7,000 texts from the Akkadian period alone are known, many later texts from the successor states of Assyria and Babylonia also deal with the Akkadian Empire. Understanding of the Akkadian Empire continues to be hampered by the fact that its capital Akkad has not yet been located, likewise, material that is thought to be Akkadian continues to be in use into the Ur III period. Many of the recent insights on the Akkadian Empire have come from excavations in the Upper Khabur area in modern northeastern Syria which was to become a part of Assyria after the fall of Akkad. For example, excavations at Tell Mozan brought to light a sealing of Taram-Agade, an unknown daughter of Naram-Sin. The excavators at nearby Tell Leilan have used the results from their investigations to argue that the Akkadian Empire came to an end due to a sudden drought, the so-called 4.2 kiloyear event. The impact of this event on Mesopotamia in general, and on the Akkadian Empire in particular. The Akkadian Period is contemporary with, EB IV, EB IVA and EJ IV, the absolute dates of their reigns are approximate. The Akkadian Empire takes its name from the region and city of Akkad, although the city of Akkad has not yet been identified on the ground, it is known from various textual sources. Among these is at least one text predating the reign of Sargon, together with the fact that the name Akkad is of non-Akkadian origin, this suggests that the city of Akkad may have already been occupied in pre-Sargonic times. Sargon of Akkad defeated and captured Lugal-Zage-Si in the Battle of Uruk, the earliest records in the Akkadian language date to the time of Sargon. Sargon was claimed to be the son of Laibum or Itti-Bel, a humble gardener, One legend related of Sargon in Assyrian times says that My mother was a changeling, my father I knew not
34.
Anno Domini
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The terms anno Domini and before Christ are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term anno Domini is Medieval Latin and means in the year of the Lord, There is no year zero in this scheme, so the year AD1 immediately follows the year 1 BC. This dating system was devised in 525 by Dionysius Exiguus of Scythia Minor, the Gregorian calendar is the most widely used calendar in the world today. Traditionally, English followed Latin usage by placing the AD abbreviation before the year number, however, BC is placed after the year number, which also preserves syntactic order. The abbreviation is widely used after the number of a century or millennium. Because BC is the English abbreviation for Before Christ, it is sometimes concluded that AD means After Death. However, this would mean that the approximate 33 years commonly associated with the life of Jesus would not be included in either of the BC, astronomical year numbering and ISO8601 avoid words or abbreviations related to Christianity, but use the same numbers for AD years. The Anno Domini dating system was devised in 525 by Dionysius Exiguus to enumerate the years in his Easter table. His system was to replace the Diocletian era that had used in an old Easter table because he did not wish to continue the memory of a tyrant who persecuted Christians. The last year of the old table, Diocletian 247, was followed by the first year of his table. Thus Dionysius implied that Jesus Incarnation occurred 525 years earlier, without stating the year during which his birth or conception occurred. Blackburn & Holford-Strevens briefly present arguments for 2 BC,1 BC, There were inaccuracies in the list of consuls There were confused summations of emperors regnal years It is not known how Dionysius established the year of Jesuss birth. It is convenient to initiate a calendar not from the day of an event. For example, the Islamic calendar begins not from the date of the Hegira, at the time, it was believed by some that the Resurrection and end of the world would occur 500 years after the birth of Jesus. The old Anno Mundi calendar theoretically commenced with the creation of the based on information in the Old Testament. It was believed that, based on the Anno Mundi calendar, Anno Mundi 6000 was thus equated with the resurrection and the end of the world but this date had already passed in the time of Dionysius. The Anglo-Saxon historian the Venerable Bede, who was familiar with the work of Dionysius Exiguus, used Anno Domini dating in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731. e. On the continent of Europe, Anno Domini was introduced as the era of choice of the Carolingian Renaissance by the English cleric and scholar Alcuin in the late eighth century
35.
Susa
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Susa was an ancient city of the Proto-Elamite, Elamite, First Persian Empire, Seleucid, and Parthian empires of Iran, and one of the most important cities of the Ancient Near East. It is located in the lower Zagros Mountains about 250 km east of the Tigris River, the modern Iranian town of Shush is located at the site of ancient Susa. Shush is the capital of the Shush County of Irans Khuzestan province. It had a population of 64,960 in 2005, in Elamite, the name of the city was written variously Ŝuŝan, Ŝuŝun, etc. The origin of the word Susa is from the city deity Inshushinak. Susa was one of the most important cities of the Ancient Near East, Susa is also mentioned in the Ketuvim of the Hebrew Bible by the name Shushan, mainly in Esther, but also once each in Nehemiah and Daniel. Both Daniel and Nehemiah lived in Susa during the Babylonian captivity of the 6th century BCE, Esther became queen there, married to King Ahasueurus, and saved the Jews from genocide. A tomb presumed to be that of Daniel is located in the area, however, the current structure is actually a much later construction dated to the late nineteenth century, ca. Susa is further mentioned in the Book of Jubilees as one of the places within the inheritance of Shem and his eldest son Elam, Greek mythology attributed the founding of Susa to king Memnon of Aethiopia, a character from Homers Trojan War epic, the Iliad. The site was examined in 1836 by Henry Rawlinson and then by A. H. Layard, in 1851, some modest excavation was done by William Loftus, who identified it as Susa. In 1885 and 1886 Marcel-Auguste Dieulafoy and Jane Dieulafoy began the first French excavations, jacques de Morgan conducted major excavations from 1897 until 1911. These efforts continued under Roland De Mecquenem until 1914, at the beginning of World War I, French work at Susa resumed after the war, led by De Mecquenem, continuing until World War II in 1940. Archaeological results from the period were very thinly published and attempts are underway to remedy this situation. Roman Ghirshman took over direction of the French efforts in 1946, together with his wife Tania Ghirshman, he continued there until 1967. The Ghirshmans concentrated on excavating a single part of the site, the pottery found at the various levels enabled a stratigraphy to be developed for Susa. During the 1970s, excavations resumed under Jean Perrot, archeologists have dated the first traces of an inhabited Neolithic village to c 7000 BCE. Evidence of a civilization has been dated to c 5000 BCE. Painted ceramic vessels from Susa in the earliest first style are a late, in urban history, Susa is one of the oldest-known settlements of the region
36.
Mosul
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Mosul is a major city in northern Iraq. Since October 2016 it has been the site of an operation led by the Iraqi Government, under Haider al-Abadi, in an effort to dislodge. The city has been under the control of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant since June 2014, and no westerner has entered the city until the latest initiative. The Battle of Mosul, an offensive to retake the city begun in October 2016, is the largest deployment of Iraqi forces since the 2003 invasion by U. S. Located some 400 km north of Baghdad, Mosul stands on the west bank of the Tigris, opposite the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh on the east bank. The metropolitan area has grown to encompass substantial areas on both the Left Bank and the Right Bank, as the two banks are described by the locals compared to the direction of Tigris. Mosuls population grew rapidly around the turn of the millennium and by 2004 was estimated to be 1,846,500, an estimated half million people fled Mosul in the second half of 2014 when the IS fought with government forces for control of the city. On November 17,2014, ISIS attacked the city of Mosul, ultimately killing seven civilians, while some residents returned, more fled in 2015 as fighting and violence increased, and US bombings pounded the city. Historically, important products of the area include Mosul marble and oil, the city of Mosul is home to the University of Mosul and its renowned Medical College, which together was one of the largest educational and research centers in Iraq and the Middle East. The University has since been closed, the Islamic States leadership in Mosul has kept the Medical College open but it is reported to be barely functional. The name of the city is first mentioned by Xenophon in his expeditionary logs in Achaemenid Assyria of 401 BC, there, he notes a small Assyrian town of Mépsila on the Tigris somewhere about where modern Mosul is today. Be that as it may, the name Mepsila is doubtless the root for the modern name, in its current Arabic form and spelling, the term Mosul, or rather Mawsil, stands for the linking point – or loosely, the Junction City, in Arabic. Mosul should not be confused with the ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh and this area is known today as the town of Nebi Yunus and is now populated largely by Kurds. It is the only neighborhood in Mosul. The site contains the tomb of the Biblical Jonah, as he lived and died in the capital of ancient Assyria. Today, this area has been absorbed into the Mosul metropolitan area. The indigenous Assyrians still refer to the city of Mosul as Nineveh. The ancient Nineveh was succeeded by Mepsila after the fall of Assyria between 612-599 BC at the hands of a coalition of Babylonians, Medes, Persians, Scythians, Cimmerians and Sagartians, the Assyrians largely abandoned the city, building new smaller settlements such as Mepsila nearby
37.
Parthian Empire
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The Parthian Empire, also known as the Arsacid Empire, was a major Iranian political and cultural power in ancient Iran and Iraq. Mithridates I of Parthia greatly expanded the empire by seizing Media and Mesopotamia from the Seleucids, at its height, the Parthian Empire stretched from the northern reaches of the Euphrates, in what is now central-eastern Turkey, to eastern Iran. The empire, located on the Silk Road trade route between the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean Basin and the Han Empire of China, became a center of trade and commerce. The Parthians largely adopted the art, architecture, religious beliefs, and royal insignia of their culturally heterogeneous empire, which encompassed Persian, Hellenistic, and regional cultures. For about the first half of its existence, the Arsacid court adopted elements of Greek culture, the court did appoint a small number of satraps, largely outside Iran, but these satrapies were smaller and less powerful than the Achaemenid potentates. With the expansion of Arsacid power, the seat of government shifted from Nisa to Ctesiphon along the Tigris. The earliest enemies of the Parthians were the Seleucids in the west, however, as Parthia expanded westward, they came into conflict with the Kingdom of Armenia, and eventually the late Roman Republic. Rome and Parthia competed with other to establish the kings of Armenia as their subordinate clients. The Parthians soundly defeated Marcus Licinius Crassus at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BC, however, Mark Antony led a counterattack against Parthia, although his successes were generally achieved in his absence, under the leadership of his lieutenant Ventidius. Also, various Roman emperors or their appointed generals invaded Mesopotamia in the course of the several Roman-Parthian Wars which ensued during the few centuries. The Romans captured the cities of Seleucia and Ctesiphon on multiple occasions during these conflicts, native Parthian sources, written in Parthian, Greek and other languages, are scarce when compared to Sassanid and even earlier Achaemenid sources. These include mainly Greek and Roman histories, but also Chinese histories, Parthian artwork is viewed by historians as a valid source for understanding aspects of society and culture that are otherwise absent in textual sources. The Parni most likely spoke an eastern Iranian language, in contrast to the northwestern Iranian language spoken at the time in Parthia, the latter was a northeastern province, first under the Achaemenid, and then the Seleucid empires. Why the Arsacid court retroactively chose 247 BC as the first year of the Arsacid era is uncertain, Bivar concludes that this was the year the Seleucids lost control of Parthia to Andragoras, the appointed satrap who rebelled against them. Hence, Arsaces I backdated his regnal years to the moment when Seleucid control over Parthia ceased, however, Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis asserts that this was simply the year Arsaces was made chief of the Parni tribe. It is unclear who immediately succeeded Arsaces I, Bivar and Katouzian affirm that it was his brother Tiridates I of Parthia, who in turn was succeeded by his son Arsaces II of Parthia in 211 BC. Yet Curtis and Brosius state that Arsaces II was the successor of Arsaces I, with Curtis claiming the succession took place in 211 BC. Bivar insists that 138 BC, the last regnal year of Mithridates I, is the first precisely established regnal date of Parthian history, due to these and other discrepancies, Bivar outlines two distinct royal chronologies accepted by historians
38.
Sasanian Empire
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The Sasanian Empire was founded by Ardashir I, after the fall of the Parthian Empire and the defeat of the last Arsacid king, Artabanus V. According to a legend, the vexilloid of the Sasanian Empire was the Derafsh Kaviani, in many ways, the Sasanian period witnessed the peak of ancient Iranian civilization. Persia influenced Roman culture considerably during the Sasanian period, the Sasanians cultural influence extended far beyond the empires territorial borders, reaching as far as Western Europe, Africa, China and India. It played a prominent role in the formation of both European and Asian medieval art, much of what later became known as Islamic culture in art, architecture, music and other subject matter was transferred from the Sasanians throughout the Muslim world. Conflicting accounts shroud the details of the fall of the Parthian Empire, the Sassanid Empire was established in Estakhr by Ardashir I. Papak was originally the ruler of a region called Khir, however, by the year 200, he managed to overthrow Gochihr, and appoint himself as the new ruler of the Bazrangids. His mother, Rodhagh, was the daughter of the governor of Pars. Papak and his eldest son Shapur managed to expand their power all of Pars. The subsequent events are unclear, due to the nature of the sources. It is certain, however, that following the death of Papak, Ardashir, sources reveal that Shapur, leaving for a meeting with his brother, was killed when the roof of a building collapsed on him. By the year 208, over the protests of his brothers who were put to death. Once Ardashir was appointed shahanshah, he moved his capital further to the south of Pars, the city, well supported by high mountains and easily defendable through narrow passes, became the center of Ardashirs efforts to gain more power. The city was surrounded by a high, circular wall, probably copied from that of Darabgird, in a second attempt to destroy Ardashir, Artabanus V himself met Ardashir in battle at Hormozgan, where Artabanus V met his death. Following the death of the Parthian ruler, Ardashir I went on to invade the provinces of the now defunct Parthian Empire. Ardashir was aided by the geography of the province of Fars, in the next few years, local rebellions would form around the empire. Nonetheless, Ardashir I further expanded his new empire to the east and northwest, conquering the provinces of Sistan, Gorgan, Khorasan, Margiana, Balkh and he also added Bahrain and Mosul to Sassanids possessions. In the west, assaults against Hatra, Armenia and Adiabene met with less success, in 230, he raided deep into Roman territory, and a Roman counter-offensive two years later ended inconclusively, although the Roman emperor, Alexander Severus, celebrated a triumph in Rome. Ardashir Is son Shapur I continued the expansion of the empire, conquering Bactria, invading Roman Mesopotamia, Shapur I captured Carrhae and Nisibis, but in 243 the Roman general Timesitheus defeated the Persians at Rhesaina and regained the lost territories
